


or maybe it's haunted

by palaces_outofparagraphs



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Alcoholism, Forgiveness, Gen, Nostalgia, Post S2, Triggers, also a cameo: landslide by fleetwood mac, also: josie has multiple boyfriends in this story, but archies not going to jail lol, it's not an editing error if you pretend it was on purpose, mental health, ptsd from a neglectful childhood, sorry this is so LONG it got away from me AGAIN, themes of trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-14
Updated: 2018-06-14
Packaged: 2019-05-23 05:41:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,018
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14928201
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/palaces_outofparagraphs/pseuds/palaces_outofparagraphs
Summary: jughead, archie, and betty, the way it was always supposed to be. discussing childhood, adulthood, trauma, and briefly reggie mantle as the rain gently washes away the past.





	or maybe it's haunted

The rain was battering the windows, the room was crowded and dark and loud, and Jughead desperately wanted to go home.

“I am not interested,” he had said to Archie, much earlier that evening, when they were getting ready to meet the girls, “in going to a party at Cheryl Blossom’s. You do understand this, right?”

“Sure thing, Jug,” Archie had said, inspecting himself very closely in the mirror and running a comb meticulously through his crop of red hair, which lay flat for a moment before springing back up. Archie was having a bad hair day. Jughead could feel his anxiety from across the room. Admittedly, it was the tiniest bit satisfying.

“Is it a sure thing,” said Jughead. “Is it? Are you on my side here?”

“Yeah. Of course.”

“So when Veronica says, let’s go to Cheryl’s, you’re going to say, no, Veronica, we’re not going to Cheryl’s?”

“Obviously.”

“Archie!”  
“Do you have any gel?”

“ _ Why would I have gel?  _ Also - we’re in your house!”

“Well, what am I supposed to do about this?”

“Wear a hat. Are you even listening to me?”

Archie dropped the comb onto his dresser with a look of vaguely apologetic resolve. “Jug, if Ronnie wants to go to Cheryl’s, we’re goin’ to Cheryl’s.”

Jughead collapsed, exhausted by the mere exchange of words, upon Archie’s bed. “Why would you do this to me? Your most loyal friend.”

Toni poked her head into Archie’s room. “Hey, you guys are coming to Cheryl’s tonight, right?”

It was at that moment Jughead knew he was doomed. 

(Toni didn’t like living at the Andrews’. The rest of the Serpents had taken to it like a house on fire, but it made Toni nervous, living on the Northside. So Jughead doubly could not refuse to go to a party at her girlfriend’s. _ Life was ridiculous. _ )

It had been a mistake, a bad idea, and he felt like objectively he had only himself to blame -- and Archie, definitely, and maybe Toni. And Cheryl. Everything was Cheryl’s fault. Cheryl was why he was now pressed up against the back wall of the large, round living room of Thistle House, crowded with stupid, loud teenagers - Northsiders, and teenage Serpents, and a variety of strangers who didn’t quite fit in either crowd. He had lost sight of Archie and Ronnie and even Betty what felt like hours ago, even though Betty hadn’t particularly wanted to be here either, but she had sat down in the kitchen with an unusually quiet Moose and a glass of wine and her “i’m-going-to-fix-this” look in her eyes. Betty still felt personally responsible for the loved ones of everyone her father had murdered. Which Jughead supposed was understandable, all things considered - though he couldn’t say he felt indebted to Cheryl, even though his father had helped hide her brother’s body. 

Betty was a better person than him, was all. 

So now he was alone, standing at the back of the room feeling awkward and out of a place in a way he hadn’t for a while. He remembered his utterly disastrous suprise birthday party from a few months ago.He never stuck out quite as much with the Serpents as he had in the Northside, but tonight wasn’t working, he was back to being that awkward kid who didn’t understand how to operate in this world where no one seemed to be quite like him, who touched his hearing aid like a nervous tic, who fell back on sarcasm easily as breathing but  _ God  _ people gathering around him with smirks on their faces made his heart race. And no one was going to do that tonight - no one was going to bully him here - probably - but he still felt uneasy, on edge. Maybe it was just a bad social anxiety day. Or maybe it was being here, in Thistle House. (Maybe, even though Betty was a better person than him, he did feel twinges of exhausting guilt whenever he saw Cheryl.)

(or, or maybe, probably, in a way he was trying really hard not to look at, it was the heavy, permeating smell of alcohol, flooding the room, the house, bringing back childhood in crashing, unforgiving waves. the smell of it made him hear FP’s yells, the crashes, his mother sobbing, jellybean pressed tiny into his chest her hands clinging to his shoulders. the trailer had smelled like this every night of the worst night of his life. and the worst was the silence, in the days after, when things were stock-still and terrifying and it still -

the smell, still lingered - )

Usually he was  _ fine,  _ he was okay, he was  _ fine.  _ But tonight, it just wasn’t working. Nothing he was doing was working, nothing could eradicate the chaos in his head. He couldn’t pry himself off the back wall of the living room. All he could hear, see, smell was the drinking, were the memories of what it had brought. He felt physically ill. He wanted to go home. He couldn’t see Betty, had no idea where she had gotten to, didn’t think he could peel himself off the wall to go find her. He didn’t know why it was so bad tonight. He hadn’t been so violently reminded of how bad things used to be.

Especially since things with his father were so, so good now. He had been sober for longer than he’d ever been; he was actively involved in life; they talked together, laughed together. The FP Jones of his childhood had all but vanished.

(he never trusted it altogether, part of him was always, always waiting for the other shoe to drop, it was an exhausting way to live, there was always tension in his wrists, at the back of his neck - )

_ Can you calm down.  _ He braced himself against the wall, dizzy.  _ You just need to get through this. This is not even that bad. Nothing is even happening right now. Teenagers are drinking. It’s what they do. You’ve spent way longer than this in the god damn White Wyrme, where it smells a thousand times worse, so why is this triggering you so badly  _ -

he hated that word,  _ triggering.  _ It was a joke, one that even Archie made sometimes, though not often, almost by accident. Moose and Reggie and the rest of the Neanderthals, however, were unabashed about it, whacking each other in the head or whatever,  _ bro are you  _ triggered? Every time he thought it in relation to himself he wanted to crawl out of his own skin, wanted to stop being such a cliche, in every way, all the time.

He wasn’t sure why this was worse than the White Wyrme. It made no sense.

“Hey.”

A voice in his ear. He turned, expecting Betty, but instead saw Toni.

“Hi,” he said.

“Are you okay?”

“Why wouldn’t I be okay?”

“I’ve been watching you.” This surprised him. Her girlfriend was the one throwing the party, so he assumed she had been too busy to watch her crazy ex across the room. Although he supposed he didn’t really count as an ex, as they’d only made out once and both of them had been solidly in love with someone else at the time. Also, it was probably weird to consider an “ex” as one one of your closest friends in the world.

No, she wasn’t his ex. She was just Toni.

He snorted, falling back on sarcasm easily as breathing. “Okay, Bates.”

She accepted with a nod and a grin, then pushed his arm. She didn’t have a cup in her hand, which made his heart beat slightly slower. “C’mon. What’s wrong? Are you just not in the party mood?”

“I’m  _ never  _ in the party mood.” He shifted uncomfortably, crossing his arms tight across his stomach. “I just - want to go home,” he said haltingly.

She bit her lip. “Wait here,” she said, before vanishing into the crowd. He wondered, vaguely, where she could possibly be going, before overwhelming terror once more superceded his thoughts.

_ drama queen,  _ he told himself.

She returned with Betty in tow, and it wasn’t like true love cured PTSD or a childhood plagued by parental alcoholism, but it was true that seeing Betty made the drums in his head recede, made the ache in his chest soften the slightest smidge. 

“Here,” said Toni, pushing her slightly. “He won’t tell me what’s wrong, so maybe he’ll talk to you.”

Jughead exhaled irately. “I don’t - I’m fine,” he said brusquely. “Sorry, Betty, you can - go back to Moose, I’m fine. Toni, will you just - ”

“Juggie.” Betty touched his arm and he wanted to break down, wanted to take to his own memories with a hacksaw, wanted to go home, home, home and whenever he thought that, he pictured the Andrews’, and how exhaustingly messed up was that, that he thought of _ home  _ as somewhere where he’d only ever been a  _ guest  _ despite what Fred overwhelmingly worked against letting him believe. Betty touched his arm and it felt like all the boundaries he had left up collapsed, and all at once he was dangerously near tears.

“It’s just not a great night,” he managed.

“Okay. It’s okay.” She slipped a hand into his, hers warm and small and soft, and he was achingly aware of how chapped and bruised his palm was against her. “It’s okay.” She leaned up on her toes, kissing his cheek. “Do you want to leave?”

Jughead bit his lip. “Maybe just get outside for a bit,” he whispered. His voice was about to crack, he could feel it coming, and he didn’t want to cry, not in front of Betty. Not here, not now. Not tonight.

“Okay. It’s okay. Come on.” She tugged on his sleeve, glancing at Toni, who moved to follow them, but at that moment, Cheryl from across the room shrieked “ _ Toni!”  _

“It’s okay,” said Jughead before she could say anything. “Go to her. It’s okay. I’m okay.”

Toni ignored him, but met Betty’s eyes, and she nodded slightly. “All right,” said Toni. She squeezed his hand then vanished into the crowd once more.

“Why does she listen to you, and not me?” said Jughead, mildly indignant.

Betty laughed, pulling him through the crowd. “Why should she?” she teased, her voice soft still. Betty was trying to calm him down. He didn’t know if that was happening, but he he was registering slight relief as they got further away from the crowds, the people - the smell of it in the air.

Eventually, they reached the kitchen - or what was probably a kitchen, though Jughead had never been in one so big, fancy, or with so many unrecognizable appliances. She unlocked and pushed open a relatively normal looking screen door, and he followed her outside to an also relatively normal - and, more importantly, empty and silent - back porch.

“How is there no one here?” he said.

“The inside and front porch is where it’s at,” said Betty, sinking gracefully to the floor, crossing her legs. “Sit down. Breathe. It’s okay.”

He sat, less gracefully. “I’m  _ fine, _ ” he said, and even he heard how jagged his voice was. “It’s just - ” he folded his arms, inhaling. It was still raining. They were covered by the porch roof, but he stretched his legs, watching the raindrops slowly coat his beat up ragged sneakers. “Tonight is rough,” he repeated, hating himself, hating his life, feeling guilty and stupid and broken and like he was never, ever going to be good enough for Betty.

She dropped her head onto his shoulder and he exhaled. “It’s okay,” she said yet again, but he found he still needed to hear it. She took his hands in hers. The rain beat down onto his shoes. “It is okay. I promise.” 

He ran his thumbs over the raised scars on her palms. “I know,” he said quietly, the rain maybe swallowing his words, but not quite. Betty could always hear him. “I know.’

The screen door opened and immediately shut with a  _ slam,  _ and Jughead turned to see Archie amble out, plopping down next to them. “Hi,” he said.

“Hi,” said Betty. “What are you doing here?”

“Did Toni send you?” said Jughead, mildly irate. He wasn’t sure when Toni had taken it upon herself to assemble his emotional support task force, but it wasn’t entirely necessary.

“No,” said Archie, sounding mildly offended. “I  _ saw  _ you guys leave. So I followed you.”

“Where’s Ronnie?” asked Betty.

“Inside,” said Archie, leaning back on his hands, sticking his feet out so his sneakers, too, “with Reggie.”

“Doesn’t that bother you?” said Jughead mildly.

Archie laughed. “She’s setting him up with Josie, again.”

“I don’t think Reggie needs Ronnie’s help,” said Betty thoughtfully.

“He does,” said Jughead. It was always fun to mock Reggie with Archie.

Betty leaned against Jughead’s shoulder. Every muscle was still taut, and even though he felt physically better now that he was away from the noise and the smell, panic was still coming in waves. He felt useless against the tides, useless to fight it back. 

Archie had known him even longer than Betty had, and Jughead had an uneasy feeling - the kind he got a lot - that he could see right through him, a feeling confirmed when Archie said, in a would-be casual voice, “kinda loud in there, huh.”

“Little bit,” said Jughead tersely.

“I hate parties like this,” said Betty. 

“You’ve always hated them,” said Archie fondly. “I still remember the first one we went to, Reggie’s birthday in eighth grade.” Archie had known Betty longer than Jughead had known her, too. Once upon a time when the world was young and life made sense, Archie was the connecting link between them, and in the past few months they’d cut him out, or he’d cut himself out, and Jughead realized with a start how much he’d missed him.

Jughead felt, ever so slightly, the waves recede. He was surviving this. He could survive this.

And sitting on a back porch with Betty and Archie, well, it almost reminded him that childhood hadn’t been all bad.

“Yeah, well, that was stupid. Thirteen is too young to have that much access to wine coolers,” said Betty.

“Was I there?” said Jughead.

“Yeah,” said Archie. “You called my dad and asked him to pick us up when Betty started crying.”

Betty burst into laughter. “God, I don’t even remebmer that. What was I crying about?”

“I remember now,” said Jughead. “You were scared your mom was gonna yell at you when she came to pick you up. So I called Fred ‘cause I knew he wouldn’t yell.”

They were quiet, remembering being thirteen and not afraid of anything except Alice Cooper.

“So if I’ve hated parties like this since I was thirteen,” said Betty. “What am I doing here?”

“To be fair I have too,” said Archie. “Why do we all keep coming?”

“Well, as of recently, we can blame Ronnie,” said Betty. “And Toni, a bit.”

“Yeah, what was our excuse for the last three years?” pointed out Jughead, and Archie snorted, pushing against his other shoulder with a bit of a grin.

“I think we grew up,” said Betty, crossing her legs underneath her. She was not poking her shoes into the rain, but maybe it was because she was wearing a pair of Veronica’s suede heels. “I don’t know when, but maybe that’s why we go to parties we don’t want to be at.”

“I think growing up is when you stop,” said Jughead.

“No, adults do things they don’t like all the time,” said Archie.

“Yeah,” said Betty. “Yeah, they do.”

They went quiet again, all three of them thinking about their fathers, and maybe about their mothers.

“So, then,” said Jughead. “What’s being an adult?”

“Not havin to tell anyone where you’re going,” said Archie. “Just getting up and,  _ bam,  _ leaving.”

“Don’t ever leave us, Arch,” said Betty softly, reaching to briefly rest her hand on his shoulder.

“I won’t,” said Archie. 

“And that’s not what makes you an adult anyway,” said Betty. “You’re an adult when you know when to stay. Not like parties. But everything else.”

“Adults never stay,” said Jughead. “Archie’s right. Being an adult is just - leaving.”

He thought of Jellybean, in Toledo, and in a roundabout way his mother -- it always hurt too much to think about his mother straight on, so he got to it by thinking of Jellybean. Before they had left - a thousand years ago - Jughead used to cut Jellybean’s toast or sandwiches into quarters for her. His mom hadn’t been any good at it, she always made them uneven, she wouldn’t eat them unless Jughead did it. So, what did she do now? Did she just not eat?

Their mother had never remembered to feed them on time anyway.

“You’re an adult when you stop caring,” said Jughead, feeling the hardness in his voice. “You’re an adult when you just do what works for you and everyone else can go to hell.”

“Not all of them,” said Betty. “Mr. Andrews isn’t like that.”

“Maybe it’s just when you know how to do your taxes,” suggested Archie.

“Maybe it’s when you get over all of the - ” Jughead stopped, pulling his legs in from the rain, pressing his knees to his chest. “Get over everything.”

“Not a single adult I know is over anything,” said Betty.

“So maybe no one ever becomes an adult,” said Archie. “Maybe everyone just stays kind of dumb forever.”

“Maybe it’s when you stop being afraid of things,” said Jug. “And you just sort of, I don’t know. You’re not afraid anymore.”

They were quiet again, for a moment.

“What’s wrong, Jug,” said Arch, in the straightforward way Archie and Jughead used to be friends, before Archie got cool and maybe cruel, before Grundy, before Jason Blossom, before Veronica, before Hiram Lodge.

But maybe they had never stopped being friends, maybe they always would be, maybe they could be again.

Jughead swallowed, trying to find the words, trying to tell them, his oldest friends in the universe, what was wrong, but it was like they were pinned down under his tongue, he couldn’t say it. He couldn’t tell them. “I just can’t do it tonight,” he said instead, helpless as the waves rolled in afresh, crushing him anew. “I just - I can’t - and usually, I’m okay, I can handle it, I’m  _ fine, _ but tonight -  ” he broke off, shaking his head. “I don’t know. I just, I can’t handle it tonight.”

“So let’s just go home,” said Archie. He didn’t need to know anymore.

Betty scooted closer to Jughead, nestling her head in his shoulder, and Jug allowed himself to match his breathing to hers. Archie rested a hand on his arm, ever so casually. He inhaled slowly, breathing in the scent of her pink shampoo and Archie’s laundry detergent. The other side of childhood: running through Archie’s back door with Betty on his heels. Sitting on the kitchen counter, making fudge at midnight when they were still young enough to invite her to their sleepovers. Stargazing through the gaps in the slats of his treehouse. When the fighting was bad, taking Jellybean to the Andrews’ for dinner. Pepperoni pizzas and sandboxes and double dog daring Archie to kiss Betty on the cheek and Betty giggling and beating him to it. 

_ They  _ were childhood. Archie and Betty and Jughead, that was what there was to remember, not the dark nights. 

The waves receded. He closed his fingers around Betty’s wrist and felt almost like everything was going to be okay.

“Let’s just go home,” said Archie again. “None of us wanna be here.. let’s go to Pop’s.”

“What about Ronnie?” said Jughead.

Archie shruged. “She’ll be fine,” he said, in a tone that made Jughead think that perhaps Archie was, in actuality, slightly annoyed by Veronica hanging over Reggie. “And she’ll be fine driving home - Betty, you coming?”

“Yeah,” said Betty, rising. “You drive, though.” She pointed to her suede heels.

“How did you guys get here?” wondered Archie. Betty and Veronica had gone in her car, and Jughead and Archie in Archie’s. “She’s wearing even higher heels.”

“Ronnie has driving shoes in all her cars.” Betty rose, yawning. “You didn’t have anything to drink, did you Arch?”

“No,” said Archie, and Jughead was faintly proud of him. He stayed sitting, though ,as Archie stood up too.

“Guys, we,” Jughead said, feeling somewhat ridiculous. “We don’t - we don’t have to leave. I’m just being stupid, really I’m - ”

“Shut up, Jug,” said Archie, extending an arm. “We already decided we have to start leaving parties early or we’ll never grow up. Right Betty?”

“Exactly,” said Betty, grinning. “Our path to adulthood.”

Jug took Archie’s hand, pulling himself up. “But it’s not a big deal,” he said, his voice almost masked by the heavy rain. He hadn’t even told them what was wrong. “It doesn’t have to be a big deal.”  
Betty slipped an arm around his waist. “Anything’s a big deal if it’s a big deal to you, Juggie,” she said quietly.

“Don’t say that, Betty,” said Archie, “we’ll have to hear about the horrors of some obscure French movie from a hundred years ago inflicted on the horror genre and how it impacted cinema as a whole, until today.”

“Shut the hell up,” shot back Jughead but he was laughing and the waves were rolling back from the tides, rolling in, maybe. Childhood was more than just the darkness, and teenagerhood was something else entirely, something brand new, something that maybe just maybe maybe maybe could be sparkling.

They walked back through the house, the smell still weighing on his chest but it weighed less with Betty and Archie by his side. Archie disappeared briefly to find and bid Veronica farewell.

“Goodnight, Toni,” said Jughead. She had materialized by their side, and stood on her toes to kiss him on the cheek. He smiled, cuffing her on the shoulder. Not an ex, just Toni.

“Is he okay?” Toni addressed Betty.

“He’s fine,” said Betty, squeezing his hand. “He’s just fine.”

“Again,” said Jughead, “mildly perturbed to not be the one addressed.’

“You’ll be addressed when you learn to talk about your problems,” Betty told him, and Toni laughed. Jughead was inexplicably gladdened that they were friends now. 

Archie returned from talking to Veronica, looking mildly irate; Betty and Jughead exchanged a knowing look but neither of them said anything. “Ready to go, Archie?” said Jughead.

“Yeah, let’s go.” Archie rooted in his pocket for his keys. 

“ _ Leaving  _ already?” Cheryl swooped down on them, decidedly not sober, eyes shining. “So soon? But the clock hasn’t even struck midnight, Cinderella.” She poked Betty, giggling.”Afraid you’re going to turn into a pumpkin early?”

“Leave her alone,” said Archie and Jughead at the same time.

“It’s fine,” muttered Betty. “Cheryl, we’re just - ”

“You  _ won’t,  _ though,” Cheryl assured her. “And either way, you have your pick of princes tonight!” She laughed again. “Where’s Ronnie, Archie? Still with Reggie?”

“Goodnight, Cheryl,” said Jughead.

“It’s the Serpent King!” cried Cheryl. “How’s - ”

“All right, come on, Cheryl,” said Toni. “That’s enough. Goodnight, guys.”

“Goodnight,” they said more or less at once, hurrying out the door.

Archie stuck his head back in a moment later, addressing Toni. “Hey uh - could you make sure Ronnie gets home okay?”

Toni rolled her eyes, smiled. “Yeah. ‘Night, Northsider.”

“Night, Topaz.” He saluted, then pitched himself out the door, running to catch up with Jughead and Betty through the pouring rain.

\--

They wound down the streets of Riverdale, Archie going at a snail’s pace. He’d only gotten his license last week and was still scared of driving in most situations, especially in the rain. Betty sat in the front seat; her suede heels abandoned, her bare feet up on the dashboard, reclining, and Jughead sat in the back, pressing his forehead against the window, contemplating whether or not the reverbations were giving him a thousand tiny concussions. The rain kept coming, the windows opaque. It was oddly comforting, the feeling that nothing in the world existed outside of the car’s interior; the radio playing softly, repeating over and over again,  _ remember me, remember me, remember me. _

“Jug,” said Archie, breaking the film-like silence that had settled comfortably over the three. “Do you wanna sleep over?”

“Why?” said Jughead.

“I dunno.” Archie slowed a little too far in advance for a coming stop sign. “There’s already a lot of Serpents in the house. So.”

Jughead thought of the trailer, thought of FP, of how far they had come, if it would be a betrayal to let his spiralling mind keep him away from his father who was  _ trying his damn best  _ and that meant something, it meant everything, but - 

_ but i’m trying my best too,  _ threaded through his mind. 

“My dad would be happy,” said Archie. “Plus, you make good waffles.”

Jug snorted, almost laughing. Archie knew him too goddamn well. “So I’m not being invited as a guest but as hired help?”

“Yeah. Exactly.” Archie came to a slow break before the turn Jug knew by heart; right for Sunnyside and the South side of Riverdale, left to go on home to the Andrews’.

_ but they’re both home,  _ he reminded himself. Maybe he just needed different kinds of homes after different kinds of nights. Maybe, if he ever talked to his father about it, he would even understand.

Maybe he didn’t need to talk to him, because FP already did understand. Something unhinged in his chest, loosened a little bit.

“Yeah,” said Jughead, and Archie turned left. “Yeah, if your dad doesn’t mind.”

They descended after this into easy, ambling conversation about the party, bits and pieces of gossip and things they had caught onto: Sweet Pea chatting up Josie in the corner, one eye on Fangs the whole time; how it had taken like one and a half drinks for Cheryl to lose her mind and whether or not burning down your house made you more of a lightweight; Chuck Clayton’s unnecessary presence; how bizarre it was to see the Serpents interacting with the Riverdale High students, and for all the world it going pretty well.

“Maybe all of them living at Fred’s helps,” said Betty. “Or a bunch of them. How long is that gonna last?”

“Long as they need to,” said Archie. “My dad says over his dead body will he allow any of those teens to leave his home until they have ironclad accomodation.”

Jughead smiled for real this time. “Typical Fred Andrews,” he said.

Archie pulled up gently outside of his house. He drove so carefully, fragilely, the same way he’d been doing everything since the insanity of the past few weeks had drawn to a tentative close. It made Jughead feel a tiny bit better about the world, to think that yes, he was broken, maybe permanently, but so were all of them. So maybe it didn’t have to be as permanent as it felt.

“You gonna be okay tonight, Betty?” said Archie, leaning his chin on the steering wheel but still clutching it with white knuckles. Archie was such a nervous driver, it was endearing.

Betty had tucked her feet under her and was resting her forehead now against the dashboard. She looked up, twisting around to meet Jug’s eye, reaching a hand out towards his. He took it and squeezed. “Am I invited to the sleepover?” she said playfully.

Jughead and Archie talked over each other insisting she could come in, nay,  _ should  _ come in, “we have a million people in the house anyway and so you can just sleep in the guest room with Toni - ” before she laughed, raising her hands to cut them off.

“Guys. I was kidding.” She reclined her seat back and lay down, Jughead scooting out of the way and leaning his chin on the shoulder of the driver’s seat. “Thanks, though, I just - I don’t want to leave my mom alone overnight.” She exhaled heavily. “Feels more like I’m her mom these days,” she said ruefully.

Archie put the car in park but didn’t turn the ignition off, the music playing on and on.  _ please/don’t/ever became a stranger,  _ it crooned,  _ who’s laugh/i/could recognize anywhere,  _ over and over and over.

“How are you holding up?” said Jughead.

Betty sighed. There was no place more honest than a parked car at midnight with your best friends. “It has been very, very terrible,” she said.

“That’s probably putting it mildly,” said Archie.

“I think part of it..” Betty stared at the roof of the car. “Part of it is that my mom feels guilty. Over - a lot of stuff, right now, but also about how she didn’t notice it was my dad.. she feels like all the murders, all the bad stuff, everything that he did to  _ me -  _ ” she shuddered, “is her fault. For not catching on. But  _ God,  _ it isn’t.”

“Betty, you know it’s not yours either, right,” said Jughead.

“It probably feels that way,” said Archie. “But it’s not. It’s neither of your fault. Neither of you could have known.”

Tears shone in Betty’s eyes like the pearls at her ears and Jughead ached with love for her, ached with desire to take this pain from her. “It might be, though,” she said, her voice almost breaking. “It might have been my fault, you know? I was.. talking to him, I should have - ”

“Betty, he held a gun to my head,” said Archie, “and I didn’t recognize him. I couldn’t move. None of us knew. None of us could have known.”

“As it is, this is more than you ever should have had to deal with,” said Jughead. “And - you are. You’re handling it, and that’s all anyone can ask of you.”

Betty sighed. “Thanks, guys,” she murmured, kneading her forehead with her hands. “Thanks. It’ll - it’ll be okay.”

“It will,” said Archie, so sure that it made Jughead believe it.

_ I’m so glad I have them,  _ he thought; there was so much wrong with the town, with his past, with the future, with his life, but he had Betty, and Archie, and the three of them together were still good, so good, and so much had changed, but by hook or by crook, come hell and come highwater, somehow at the end of the day they still had each other.  _ I’m so glad I’ve got them. _

Jughead squeezed her hands gently, rubbing so Archie couldn’t see the raised scars on her palm. “Are you sure you’ll be okay in there?” he said softly.

“Yeah,” said Betty, staring ahead at her house, lined with white picket fence. “Yeah. I’ll be okay.”

“Call me,” said Jug. “If you aren’t. Or just come over.”

“Really, Betty,” said Archie. “Anytime, if you need to come over.. you know where we’ll be.”

Betty smiled, giving Archie a quick, one armed hug. “Thanks for the ride, Arch,” she said. “Make sure Ronnie gets home, yeah?”

“I will. Sleep well, Betty.”

“Goodnight, Juggy,” she said, leaning across the seat and kissing him softly. “Are you okay?”

He didn’t want to say ,then, what was wrong; didn’t want to tell Betty, didn’t want to see the creasing of worry in her eyes. She was already carrying so much, all her mother’s burdens, the burdens of the whole town and that of the loved ones of all the people her father had hurt. 

So she didn’t need his pain, too; she didn’t need to carry it, the way she was carrying everything like a pan of shallow water that might spill all over hands any moment. He loved her so much, and he couldn’t bring himself to add to the exhaustion in her shaking hands, the bags under her eyes.

“I’m okay,” he said. “I’ll talk to you in the morning.” In the morning, it would all hurt less. In the morning, he would be able to tell her without fearing she would swallow it whole and let it shred the inside of her throat on the way down.  _ I love you,  _ he didn’t say ‘cause Archie was in the car and it was all kind of embarrassing, still, but he squeezed her hand again and thought she kenew.

“Okay,” she said, opening the door. “Take care of yourselves, guys.”

Archie turned the ignition off, but the radio stayed on.

“Something wrong with your radio,” noted Jughead.

“Yeah, or maybe it's haunted,” said Arch, twisting around to face Jughead more clearly. 

They were quiet for a moment.

“It was the alcohol,” said Jughead eventually, the words finally releasing, the music and the calmness of the best people in his life loosening something in his heart, in his mind. He didn’t want to tell Betty, didn’t want to heap it onto her shoulders, but maybe it was okay to talk to Archie. The radio was still crooning.  _ well, _ it sang,  _  i’ve been afraid of changes, ‘cause i built my life around you, but time makes you bolder, even children get older, and me, i’m getting older too.  _ “The smell of, it. I couldn’t, usually it’s fine. Usually, even hagning around in the White Wyrme is okay, but God, tonight I just -- it just reminded me of everything about childhood that I don’t want to remember.” He balled up his fists so his knuckled turned white. “And it was just crowding into my brain and not leaving space for anything else.” He took a breath. “Sorry that I couldn’t talk about it, and,” his voice was about to crack, but he didn’t want to cry, not in front of Archie _ ,  _ “thanks, Archie for - for leaving. Sorry, I couldn’t tell you what was wrong, sorry that I, that - ”

“Hey.” Archie’s hand landed soft on his shoulder as Jug pressed his face into the soft upholstery of the driver seat’s shoulder, unable to look at him, unable to bear witness to what was surely something on his face that he never wanted to see. All his life he had livd in quiet, silent awe of Archie, and now here was, broken and tattered and no point hiding it anymore. “Jughead. Hey. It’s okay.”

Jughead didn’t say anything, he couldn’t, because how could it be okay? How could it be okay when the world was so broken, when  _ he  _ was so broken, when he couldn’t even go to a damn party -

he didn’t want to look at Archie.

“It’s okay,” repeated Archie. “It’s okay, Jug. It’s just like that sometimes.”

“It’s not, it shouldn’t be, it doesn’t make sense - and I couldn’t, I can’t tell Betty, I don’t want her to know, don’t want her to know that I can’t even handle - don’t want her to think, I’m I dunno, whatever, that I’m - ”

“I’m not going to  _ tell  _ her,” said Archie, and he sounded so, so remarkably like Fred that it made Jughead able to look up from the seat, look at him, at his calm, unbothered face, not creased with pity or disdain like he was so terrified it would have been. He felt himself relaxing, by an inch. Archie wasn’t eloquent or particularly good in a crisis, but he was good, excellent, at talking Jughead down from ledges. He always had been. He got it, of course, from Fred. “But you know she wouldn’t - she wouldn’t. Mind. Think you were, whatever.” 

“But I am. I am, whatever.”

“No, you’re not. You’re not whatever,” using it both as a placeholder and as the word itself - maybe he was more eloquent than Jughead gave him credit for. “You’re just Jughead.” It made so much sense that there didn’t seem to be room for argument. “You’re Jughead, and you’ve been through lots of insane crap. Just like all the rest of us, but yours started a little earlier, and you  _ deal  _ with it. You do deal with it. It’s just, sometimes it’s a bad night.”

He was breathing again, a little bit easier. He didn’t say anything, and Archie forged on, in his ramshackle, taping words together way. “It just happens, brains are like that,” he said confidently, and Jughead believed him. “One second everything’s fine, chugging on and then _ bam,  _ suddenly you’re crying into your milkshake.”

Jughead snorted with laughter that surprised even him. “Do you cry into milkshakes, Arch?”

“No,” said Archie indignantly. Then, remembering the point, he added, “but if I  _ did,  _ it would be  _ okay. _ ‘Cause it happens. It’s called psychology.”

“Is it really.” All of a sudden everything felt much less serious, feels like him and Archie talking in the beat up Sedan like they have a million times before. Fred used to drive them around in it, and he would get out of the car and they would stay in it for like an hour at least. Suddenly it was every other time and maybe it was okay, the exhaustion feeling less end of the world. “Sorry we left so early.”

“Stop being stupid. Who wants to go to a party at the Blossoms, anyway.”

Jug laughed. “Veronica,” he said, the question in the name, and Archie sighed.

“It’s fine,” he said.

“Did you guys have a fight?”

“Not really. She just didn’t care I was leaving.”

“Oh.” Betty would never react like that, thought Jughead, deciding once more that the universe had allotted the four of them correctly. “It’s okay.”

Archie softly punched the passenger seat. “Do you think Veronica has a thing for Reggie?”

“I think everyone does,” said Jughead.

Archie punched Jughead instead. “Shut up, Jug.” It was all okay now. “Let’s go inside. You okay?”

“I will be,” said Jughead, wry again,  _ I am. With you, I am. _

Archie turned the radio off, then down.  _ the landslide’ll bring you down.  _ “Not haunted,” he said.

“Jury’s still out,” said Jughead, ‘cause the whole damn town was haunted, actually, but maybe it was all right.

\--

They talked to Fred for a little while, because he was waiting up in the kitchen, and then they went to bed. Archie put out the old air mattress Jughead felt like he had spent half his life on and they got into pajamas and into bed without talking much, both of them feeling tireder than they had in a long time. Archie left to brush his teeth and Jughead settled on the bed, feeling memory, so sharp and close tonight, settle around him like a fog. This room, too, was childhood.

He looked at his phone, wondering about FP. If he was waiting up, in the kitchen of the trailer, like Fred had been for Archie. If he was pacing, thinking Jug was getting late, wondering why anyone would go to a party at the Blossoms. If he remembered where Jug said he was going to be tonight. If he cared. If he was awake at all, or passed out on the couch. Maybe passed out while waiting? Or maybe he just hadn’t noticed he was gone, didn’t care.

His phone started going off, and he let it hum three times before picking up.

“Hi, Dad,” he said.

“Jug - you okay?”

“I’m - ” his voice broke, the way it had been threatening to all night long, and there were tears sliding down his cheeks now but maybe it was okay because maybe, maybe he could forgive his father. Because his father had been waiting up for him. “Yeah. I’m okay. I’m sleeping over at the Andrews, okay?”

“Okay. Fred all right?”

“Fred’s fine. You okay, Dad?”

“Yeah. I was waiting up.” FP yawned enormously. “Goin’ to bed now, if you’re okay. Something wrong?”

Jughead passed a hand over his face, feeling a thousand years old. It had been one of the most emotionally exhausting nights of his life.

Tomorrow, he would open his mouth again and talk. Talk to Betty, tell her what had happened, let her take his hands between her soft fingertips and reassure him all over again. And talk to his father for real, maybe, maybe even tell him what had happened, how the smell of liquor sent him into dizzying panic. He wouldn’t absolve his father, but he would forgive him, and he would be lighter for it. “I’ll - can we talk tomorrow, Dad?”

“Yeah. ‘Course.” He could hear FP’s hesitation. “Are you - if you want to come home,” his voice was almost plaintive, and Jug thought about how remarkable it was, how far they had come, and he wiped the tears off his cheeks. “I can come get you. If you want.”

He was tempted, but he was so exhausted he could have slept for weeks, and his dad probably was too. But knowing that he could healed something inside of him, and he thought maybe you broke and healed and broke and healed and broke and healed and then one day, after all of it, you were an adult. 

Or maybe being an adult was having a home to go to, or more than one.

“It’s okay, Dad,” and it was. “I’ll see you tomorrow, okay?”

“Okay. Goodnight, boy.”

“Goodnight.”

He turned his phone off as Archie came back into the room. “Who was that?” asked Archie.

“My dad.”

“Oh. I thought maybe it was Toni. I think I should call Ronnie, right?”

Jughead almost smiled. Archie and Veronica would be fine. “Yeah. Probably.” He yawned. “Do it somewhere else, though, I’m going to bed and this light’s going off.”

“It’s my house, remember.”

“Yeah, whatever.” Jughead chucked a pillow at him. “Turn it off.”

Archie did, went to call Veronica, and came back fifteen minutes later, when Jughead was half asleep.

“She home?” he mumbled.

“Yeah,” whispered Archie, easing into his own bed. “She’s okay. Everything okay with your dad?”

“Yeah,” said Jughead, and miraculously, even after the whole night, after his whole life, it was. Or it would be anyway. “Night Arch. Thanks -- you know. For everything.”

“G’night, Jug.” 

Jughead slipped without knowing it into a peaceful sleep, and for the first time in a long time, the present and the future felt bigger than the past.

 

The End


End file.
